


Caroline and Margaret

by Lochinvar



Series: Normal [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Black Dogs, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Chicago (City), Exorcisms, F/F, F/M, Gen, Germany, Ghosts, Girl Power, Haunting, Hunters & Hunting, M/M, Milwaukee, Minor Character Death, Nazis, Nightclub, Non-Graphic Violence, POV Outsider, Pre-Canon, Revenge, Soul Bond, Soulmates, Spells & Enchantments, Supernatural Procedural, Teen Crush, Teen Dean Winchester, Teen Sam Winchester, Teen Years, Teen fic, Teenagers, Teens in love, Timestamp, Vampires, Were-Creatures, Werecats, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-25
Updated: 2018-01-25
Packaged: 2019-03-09 03:26:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13472730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lochinvar/pseuds/Lochinvar
Summary: While they prepared the Hunter funeral pyres in rural Kansas after the end of the Black Coven’s demonic storms, Dean remembered the last case he, Sammy, and John had worked with the sisters, Caroline and Margaret (aka Maggie or Magpie) Engel, four years before.A story of love and revenge in an enchanted night club.A timestamp for the work called NormalAt the time, Dean was 18; Sam was 14.





	1. South Chicago

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Paradigmenwechsel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paradigmenwechsel/gifts).



> Caroline and Margaret Engel are sister Hunters mentioned in Chapters 18 and 19 of Normal.
> 
> The Winchester brothers were not the only Hunter siblings with a soul bond. Another version of what it meant to be "normal" in the Hunter community.
> 
> Although this is part of the longer "Normal" work, you don't have to read it to understand this story. For the record, most of this was written months before the recent backdoor pilot for the Wayward Sisters.
> 
> I was born and raised on the South Side of Chicago, close enough to the mills that my mother had to wipe the soot from the window sills every day. But she never complained. Happy that the hardworking men and women had good jobs.
> 
> [February 8, 2019: This is one of my favorite pieces, but one of the least popular. I changed the title and added some tags. Hope it helps.]

Near the mouth of the Calumet River on Lake Michigan - February, 1997

The Winchesters, father and sons, had joined a group of Hunters for a weekend in a neighborhood that came to be called South Works, near the Illinois/Indiana border on the South Side of Chicago. They were gathering to exorcise a mob of angry ghosts that haunted a burned-out shell of a nightclub, the _Blue Lagoon,_ where their human vessels had been slaughtered en masse decades before.

The building, which looked like something left after a bombing raid in a forgotten war, squatted in a deserted industrial park near the lakefront. The neighborhood once had been a hub for dozens of family-owned tool-and-die job shops that serviced the shuttered steel mills.

The _Blue Lagoon_ had been known for the cream of the blues and jazz musicians who played never-ending sets for good money. For the decent, cheap rotgut and suds and black-hearted coffee and the generous plates of breakfast and bar food available whenever a hardworking man or woman was thirsty or hungry, served 24/7.

It also was held in high regard for the fact that it was an integrated island of goodwill in divided times.

The men who worked in dangerous conditions in the steel mills learned to trust each other, regardless of skin color, ethnicity, religion, or creed, or which baseball team earned their devotion. Invited each other’s families to summer barbecues and winter holiday parties. Married each other’s sisters in cathedrals and courthouses and churches and the occasional Reform Jewish temple and in parks and backyards.

One early Sunday morning in February, 1947, the place was packed. A typical frigid Chicago winter predawn with the cold wind from the lake penetrating layers of sweaters like a knife in the heart. 4 am.

The club ignored the existing laws, and the law ignored the club, except that most of the cops and firefighters in the county knew where to go after hours for a Hamm’s, cheap shots of whiskey and schnapps, scrambled eggs, or a hot dog with all the fixings. (Except ketchup, of course. Illegal in Chi-town. Look it up.)

Some boys from Memphis had come up and were jamming the joint. Blond, broad-shoulder Poles and Ukrainians and Swedes, whose sons would become legends in the National Football League, and wiry Italians, all muscle, whose grandfathers had quarried marble for American post offices and museums, and Mexicans, whose skin tanned like leather from the heat of the blast furnaces, rubbed shoulders with black men from Texas and Mississippi and native Americans from Florida and Oklahoma. Wives and girl friends and sisters and brothers and aunties and daughters, sitting on their laps or dancing, so close.

Sometimes boy-to-boy and girl-to-girl. Some stared, but nobody cared. Not really.

And night riders from one of those towns in southern Illinois that might as well have been Birmingham or Little Rock came up the old Route 66 and parked their stock cars (the same ones they would drive to work on weekdays and race on Saturday afternoons) a couple of blocks from the club, idling with their best drivers behind the wheels, motors running hot.

A couple of girls they brought with them distracted the lookout. (Not every cop in Will County was on the take, more’s the pity.)

The haters, drunk on _Old Crow_ , nailed the doors shut from the outside and poured gasoline along the walls. And whooped as they set their fires and fled.

Locals thought that the mills’ furnaces were firing up for a custom pour. Until they heard the sirens.

There were no survivors.

For decades, it was common knowledge that the departed souls returned to carouse on the anniversary of the blaze. And if you were a good-hearted person, you could join the revelers, drink and dance and neck with a willing specter, and then you could leave. No harm.

But, if you stayed until just after the false dawn was breaking over Lake Michigan, 4 am on the dot, there was a good chance you would be swept away, trapped until the following year, when you would wake up in the cold, empty nightclub, surrounded by broken walls still covered with soot and open to the sky.

And you would be fine, just fine, walking home in the icy light of early morning to friends and family who were simultaneously furious and overjoyed.

“Where the hell were you this year? We were worried sick.”

Okay, you were fine. But, you were a little bit fey. Distant and dreamy, at times. Absent-minded. And mostly, if you were smart, you would stay away from the place, forever. With a grand story to tell the next generation, which would never believe a word.

If you fell in love that night, you might return the next year to find him or her and never be seen again, to dance and celebrate with your new friends, once a year, and sleep until the anniversary came around again.

But, say you were a blighted soul, like the ones who hammered the nails and lit the fires. A bigot, a racist, a bully, the kind of person who believed that some people were not as good as others.

Someone who would set up an ambush outside of a gay bar with your buddies and take potshots with your 22s, who wouldn’t get around to fixing the furnaces in your slums in the dead of winter, who sold shoddy goods to poor immigrants who would be too frightened to complain. You, male or female, would find your way to the wide open doors of the Blue Lagoon, which would be looking and sounding really good, calling to you from miles away, lights on, the music pouring out into the cold starry night.

And you would come inside, the liquor was free, for you, and the ghosts danced for your pleasure, and just before dawn, at 4am, as the spirits dissolved into the dark, you would find yourself alone in a burning building with no exit.

Once a year, like clockwork, the _Blue Lagoon_ would burn down, again.

Locals would see the flames licking the sky. Would lock their doors and pull down the shades. Turn up the volume on their televisions. Knew what it meant.

The sound of the screams would carry for miles. But, as the years went by and the steel mills closed, newcomers and doubters would claim it was just the winter wind blowing through the broken windows of the abandoned factories.

Your body would be charred beyond recognition, but there was always a wallet, or a set of car keys, or a business card, left untouched, enough information to link the remains to dental records.

And, your soul would be claimed by Hell.


	2. The Family Business

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Dean meet Caroline and Margaret.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Talismen are those folks who informally and formally support the efforts of Hunters and the Men (and Women and Entities) of Letters.

Although it might be argued that the world would do better with fewer tarnished souls, the Hunter community decided that the spirits that haunted The _Blue Lagoon_ needed to find a place to party that didn’t lure human victims, no matter their history of bad deeds, to a fiery end. Fifty years was long enough.

The increase in the number of souls engaged in revenge and the intensification of their powers–their reach was expanding–would require at least twelve Hunters, male and female, to generate sufficient spiritual energy through spell and prayer to send the ghosts upstairs.

There was John and his boys. Some of the Hunters thought Sammy was too young at fourteen, but a demonstration of his skills with a set of throwing knives quickly changed their minds.

Rufus and Bobby were there, even though they weren’t speaking. Omaha, you know.

Annie Hawkins, that sweet woman who managed to sleep with most of the single Hunters south of the Canadian border. She had standards: No married men or women. Still maintained the community’s trust and respect.

The rest of the team had been recruited from the Midwest. Hunters whose families had relatives with connections to the steel mills and who had distant cousins that had been caught in the blaze. Wanted to pay their respects and help them find peace.

And then there were the sisters, Caroline and Margaret “Maggie” Engel, from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Just about Dean and Sam’s ages. Such pretty girls. Wore flowery blouses under their oiled canvas coats and delicate crosses of silver and gold around ivory necks. High cheekbones and pale blue eyes that seemed to glow in the night. Long, light brown hair braided with ribbons that matched the color of their eyes.

On their coats they each wore an enameled pin in the shape of a white rose.

They looked like the archetypal milkmaids used to promote Swiss chocolate and Belgian beer.

The Engel sisters radiated a kind of purity so that even the rough trade that hung out in the Hunter life became protective older siblings around them. The Engels accepted their small courtesies with good grace; a kindness might be rewarded with a kiss on the cheek, which would raise a blush from the toughest old coots. (Talking about you, Bobby. And Rufus. Not John. They reminded him too much of Mary.)

Dean and Sam noticed that no one blinked that the two fragile-looking teenage girls were welcomed on what might be a very dangerous hunt. The boys, responding like normal adolescents, immediately took a whiny “It’s not fair” stance, until they caught the intoxicating scent of sweet woodruff and attar of roses that wafted around the sisters.

The speed at which they were smitten was comical.

The older Hunters watched with amusement as the boys stammered their way through the equivalent of a double date with chaperones. The crew had settled in at a lakeside bar, frequented by law enforcement and Coast Guard regulars, while they waited for the sun to set. A sympathetic waitress set the teens up in their own booth by a window. Soft drinks and burgers and fries. Hot cocoa to ward against the cold winds blowing off the lake. And a plate of crescent-shaped, handheld fried apple pies, the amalgamation of the pastries of a half-dozen countries.

But when the four teens began to swap stories of hunts and cases, it was as if they had known each other forever, and they fell into the more comfortable roles of cousins at a holiday reunion.

The sisters’ German grandparents from both branches of the family tree were part of a prosperous, tightknit tribe of devout Lutherans (and Men of Letters legacies). They had stayed in their homeland despite the rise of the Nazi party. Wanted to use their positions of wealth and status to stem the tide of hatred and oppression.

When that didn’t work, they became members of a top-secret German freedom fighter cells, the bravest of the brave, challenging the Reich in Berlin under the noses of the High Command.

They aligned with activists like Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Niemöller and the _White Rose_ society in Munich. The evil Supernatural aspects of Hitler’s reign of terror seemed a good fit for Christian Adepts who knew about the power of silver and sigils and wards and Holy Water.

When their grandparents were caught and executed, their parents fled to France and went deep underground, focusing on hunts that targeted and eliminated the monsters that were aligning with the Vichy government.

Were part of the Hunter brigade that protected the beaches of Normandy against demon interference during the Allied invasion.

After the war, the Engel parents moved to the United States and discovered Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where the bank tellers spoke German and the restaurants served the delicacies of their youth and a bartender never questioned one’s order for a brandy old-fashioned. Under the cover of professorships in religion and literature at Marquette University, working with their new Jesuit compatriots, they began covert American careers as Talismen and Hunters.

When the sisters were old enough to learn the family business, their parents discovered that the girls had exceptional skills as Hunters, as if they were born with innate powers.

At an early age, the siblings would slip away together to track and kill monsters in the rural counties of Wisconsin and Illinois. Their parents finally gave up trying to keep them away from the hunt.

Caroline and Margaret reminded more than one Hunter of domestic cats. On one hand, they were beautiful and sweet and affectionate. Liked people. Liked curling up under a warm quilt in front of a fire on a cold night. Big blue eyes like those of the Siamese feline tribe. When they weren’t hunting, they wanted nothing more than napping and snacking, listening to music, reading books, and cuddling. Always together.

Loved to sleep in. If you didn’t know better you would call them lazy.

They also loved to dance. Their parents taught them the formal ballroom moves from the old country, but the girls were facile at everything from rock-and-roll to hip hop. At Hunter gatherings, they were the belles of the ball, taking turns with everyone and anyone, regardless of what the jukebox was playing.

On the other hand, they thrived on scoops of steak tartare, with a raw egg yolk staring up from a dimple in the middle of the fresh-ground uncooked beef, sprinkled with capers and chopped parsley, and the rarest of seared and smoked salmon dishes, the equivalent of Midwestern sushi.

Preferred working in the dark. Had the knack for unlocking doors and climbing out windows and leaping from trees and heading out at night, without a sound, without leaving a trace, only to return at dawn as if they had never left.

Never hesitated when killing monsters, even when the creatures took human form. The sisters were calm and deadly, working in tandem, as ruthless as the most seasoned hunter. Capable with any weapon. Maggie preferred knives, as did Sam, her Winchester counterpart. Caroline liked rifles, the longer the barrel the better.

The eager, nay joyful look in their eyes when entering a deserted barn populated with vamps or werewolves had been known to cause consternation even among the toughest opponents.

“Those Engel girls,” said a defiant monster before decapitation.

“They scare me.”

More than one person in the Hunter community speculated the girls had genetic ties to Freya, the Nordic goddess whose chariot was drawn by cats, or the kobolds, Germanic sprites that sometimes took on the appearance of felines.

Or, perhaps, genuine were-cats hid in their family tree: rare shape shifters that tended to avoid humans and were off the radar of most of the hunting community. More common in attachments to the white witch covens, such as familiars like Maurice the were-cougar who lived up near Ashland, Wisconsin. [See Chapter Fourteen of [Normal](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11039823/chapters/24728919).]

The truth was that they were young human women, physically gifted with the strength and agility and speed usually associated with Olympic-level athletes or high-wire acrobats. Superior muscle memory. Fearlessness. Night vision. Intelligent. The ability to process information quickly and take action even under life-and-death pressure, like an Army sniper.

Like the Winchester boys.

In a different world these four young people, sets of brothers and sisters who were the inevitable culmination of two rarified royal lineages, would have been matched and mated. Dean and Caroline, Sam and Margaret. (Sammy and Magpie to their fond older siblings.)

But like the brothers, the sisters were soul mates. They scrunched up close next to each other on the benches of Hunter dives. Even as they grew older they had their arms around each other, brushing the top of each other’s forehead with light kisses. Only bothered to book one bed when they were on the road. Held hands as they walked down the street. Politely indifferent to other boys and girls their age when it came to romance.

It was easier for girls in those days to show public affection. Common among many cultures.

But the four young Hunters recognized each other as kindred spirits. Understood the tacit bonds that pulled them together.


	3. The Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The four teens would be the center of the hunt, distracting the ghosts while the adults exorcized their vengeful souls.

By unspoken agreement John and Rufus were in charge of the crew. During larger, more complicated cases, the ragtag assembled groups of whatever Hunters were available to answer a call to arms usually deferred to the older men and women with more experience, unless special skills were needed.

When they grew up, Dean and Sam were to become the default leaders for most big events in the Hunter community.

In this hunt, the four teens were to have a special role because of the purity of their hearts and, as was to be demonstrated, their special connection with each other: their linked souls.

They were going to be the distraction the older Hunters needed. In other words, bait.

\-----

A caravan of old trucks and station wagons slowly made its way through residential blue-collar neighborhoods of modest bungalows, which, in their day, were considered palaces by immigrants who never dreamed of being able to buy their own homes. Then, across ancient railroad tracks and into the industrial park, past the skeletons of warehouses, and towards the lights and sounds of a raucous, happy party in progress.

The _Blue Lagoon._

A few local mortals stood a safe distance from the club, which looked, in the starlight, as it had fifty years before. An ancient woman, in winter clothes, wrapped in a blanket against the wind, weighed down by a half-century of grief, watched for a glimpse of a sister, as she had for decades.

One of the Hunters went over and talked with her. Gave her a hug. Reassured her that they’d be reunited in Heaven some day. Told her to go home. Told her he and his friends were there to send the spirits home as well.

A couple of teenagers, on a dare, wanted to enter the club, but John strode over, whispered a few terrifying words in their ears, and they scooted away, relieved to have a reason to flee.

But, there was a man pulling up in a black Mercedes. Well-dressed in an ankle-length, camel hair coat over a formal business suit. Warm knit hat with a Chicago Bears logo. Fur-lined driving gloves. Grey cashmere scarf around his neck. Old-fashioned galoshes over expensive wingtips. He looked puzzled, as if surprised to find himself in front of the club, as if he had driven there in a fever dream and was just waking up.

A prominent member of the power structure of Cook County politics, an elected member of the Chicago City Council, the type of crook that was very familiar to the former residents of Soviet bloc countries. Lived off the greed of elected officials and the desperation of the poor and disenfranchised. Clueless supporters praised him for his kind deeds and philanthropy, not knowing the cost to the community of those crumbs of generosity.

Sort of like when a cancer gnaws away at the gut of a friend who has struggled her whole life to lose weight, and thoughtless acquaintances are telling how good she looks.

He had been leaving a political meeting in downtown Calumet City when a breeze brought an echo of music. At first, he shook it off, but then found himself driving towards the abandoned steel mills. On automatic, like when you’re on a familiar commute home from work.

Now he stood, and stared. A couple of women, as corporeal as the Hunters who were gathering in the empty parking lot next to the club, were beckoning to the politician from the front door. They were lovely: wavy hair, tight skirts and tighter sweaters, long legs, high heels, red lips, and big smiles.

They gestured, in unison, in the universal language of “Wanna have some fun?”

Rufus, always the gracious diplomat (in his own mind), walked up to the alderman and, without preamble, told him, “You must be some mean, corrupt, soulless son-of-a-bitch to be seduced into driving down to the _Blue Lagoon_ in fricking freezing Chicago in the middle of the night, and if you stay, you probably will be killed, burned to death, so dirt bag, get going, you idiot, even though you probably deserve to be murdered the way these ghosts intend to murder you.”

The man looked through Rufus as if he hadn’t heard the Hunter and walked into the club, shedding his overcoat at the door and loosening his tie. Disappearing into the crowd on his journey to hell.

Rufus turned, looked at his friends, and shrugged.

“Hey man, I tried,” he said.

And they went to work.

\-----

The four teenaged Hunters were to enter the club as a group. They each were equipped with wristwatches with alarms, so they would be alerted when it was time to go. No argument, unless they planned to be lost to this world for a year.

John made sure that the Impala had her heat on high to offer a safe, warm place to update their wardrobes. They took turns. The girls changed into matching blue wool skirts and sweaters, the boys into slacks, white shirts, and ties.

They were coached about what to say and do. They would be offered food and drink, but all Hunters knew the rules, going back to the time of the Little People of the Celts and the cautionary tale of Persephone and her pomegranate seeds: Don’t break bread or sip the wine of enchanted lands with the entities that live there, if you ever want to leave. Pastor Jim told Rufus and Bobby that this was a myth with no substance, but no one was taking chances.

Everyone agreed the young quartet would be safe from harm, as long as they left the club before 4 am. They would beckon to the assembled spirits and keep them engaged, giving the Hunters assembled in the parking lot more time to execute their spell.

And dang, those kids were good-looking. Caroline and Dean turned heads wherever they went, and Magpie and Sammy were adorable, with the promise of more to come in later years.

All four young people had pure souls. Sam and the girls were technically virgins, as were the most powerful of the members of old-world covens: the witches and warlocks who were called _Miracle Workers_. Even in the 21 st century there would be powerful Adepts, like Pastor Jim, who would maintain their celibacy for the extra power it gave them. Probably had been source of the Engel sisters’ special abilities.

Dean? Well, yes, Dean had experience, but he also was the Righteous Man, with a soul that would glow even in Hell.

Sam’s demon blood infection left troubling traces in his aura, but his soul still was clean, so a lower-level Supernatural entity like a ghost would not detect a problem. (Not sure if John and Bobby knew about Sam’s Boy King of Hell prophesy in 1997.)

The teens paired up as boy-girl couples, and hand-in-hand, entered the club, brushing by spirits made solid, Dean and Caroline in the lead.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am a native Chicagoan. Don't think my description of the alderman–the Chicago equivalent of a city council elected official–was exaggerated.


	4. The Blue Lagoon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They send the souls back home.

Like many neighborhood bars, the _Blue Lagoon_ was a family hangout during the day and early evening, where children were fed French toast and fries from their parents’ plates, drank Green River (a local soft drink aka “pop”), cherry colas, and chocolate phosphates, and did homework, papers and books spread over the tables, when the light poured in from the windows, curtains open.

So having underage teens wander in was not new. On the anniversary night in the decade just after the fire, children came, along with adult family members, looking for loved ones. Some of the adults chose to stay. The children were indulged for an hour or so and then, with compassion, shooed out, back to their mortal families.

Heads high, the four young Hunters headed for the crowded dance floor. Of the four, Sam was the least skilled at dancing, but made up for it with those long limbs, cute bangs, world-class dimples, and the hazel eyes that glittered in the dim light.

Without being obvious, Maggie notched Sammy’s hands around her waist, and she led him through a plausible set of swing and foxtrot numbers. However, it wasn’t too long before they both felt taps on their shoulders as eager ghosts fell in line for a dance with the appealing mortals.

Dean and Caroline were made for each other. Same height, same compelling beauty. The crowd made a place for them on the floor, and more and more of the spirits stopped to watch and comment. They had the moves; flowed as one.

Meanwhile, the Chicago alderman, a gorgeous ghost babe on each arm, was making merry with boilermakers. He didn’t see how the eyes of the women had begun to glow red.

The performers from Memphis immediately noticed the newcomers and broaden the range of their sets to test their moves. No one was disappointed. When a small but very vocal group demanded a polka, they got a polka, and Dean swung the lovely Caroline around the floor, her braids flying.

During a rare break in the music, one of the spirits, a man with a Navy tattoo prominent on a muscular arm, came up to Sam and asked:

“What year is it?”

Sam blinked, then sighed.

“1997, sir,” the boy said. “You've missed a lot. Your family is in Heaven. They miss you.”

“Fifty years,” the ghost said, in wonder.

Walked away, shaking his head in disbelief.

It was time. While the teen Hunters danced and flirted, the adults had been hard at work. Lighting incense to cleanse the air. Mixing potions and starting the long prayers in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Small lights sparked from bronze bowls.

These were not the usual harsh exorcisms used for demons. If there was such a thing as a kind and loving banishing spell, this was it. Slowly the powers of the ghosts were being contained and reduced as the portals to the next life opened.

Fog began to float in from Lake Michigan and the Calumet River and rise from the ground around the Hunters.

At 3:30 am, the alarms on the teens’ wristwatches began to buzz in unison. Time to leave.

Stay, said a dozen voices, heavily accented in Polish and Russian and Italian.

The teens felt the pull of the spirits. But then, as per the plan, they switched partners, and aligned, brother-to-brother, sister-to-sister, with Caroline and Dean holding their younger sibling with a protective arm around their shoulders and waist. And the soul bonds fell into place in with what some of the ghosts heard as an audible click, like a bolt in a lock: the innate warding against outside Supernatural influences.

Would save both pairs of sibling Hunters more than once in the coming years.

They were leaving just as the more aware of the spirits began to feel the influence of the Hunters’ spell. As the quartet of mortals walked out the front door, the corporeal manifestations began to shiver and dissolve. Their souls, as usual, manifested as white lights, and they rose into the night. The club disappeared, and all that was left was the broken walls, reaching up to sky as if to follow the spirit to their final resting place.

In a drunken stupor, the alderman was sitting on the floor of the empty building having escaped death and put off, for a time, his inevitable damnation. His coat was gone, but someone pulled an old blanket out from the back of a truck. Bobby called someone who knew someone who knew someone, and a cab showed up to whisk him away.

\-----

Although no one had slept, everyone in the crew of Hunters was wide awake. Most of the team packed up their equipment, removing any evidence of the exorcism rites.

John took his sons and the girls back to a nearby motel, where he had booked a room just in case they needed a place to stage a retreat and regroup. The girls changed backed to their jeans and coats in the tiny washroom while the brothers shed the slacks, shirts, and ties in exchange for their Hunter attire.

Rufus and Bobby phoned local clergy, to let them know that the souls had been put to rest. Masses were held, and candles were lit. For the atheists, it was just an anniversary to remember the victims of the fire. For the believers, a time to celebrate and give thanks.

The Hunters returned to the lakeside bar for a solid breakfast before they drove back to their homes across the Heartland. Once again the four teens sat together. Ate pancakes and sausages and drank hot chocolate.

The boys were shy, and the girls were bold, reaching across the table to touch their hands. When they all got up to leave, Bobby paying the bill, the girls took turns giving each boy a kiss on the lips, a hug, and a whispered good-bye.

And drove off in the small used blue Toyota sedan their parents had bought them for Caroline’s 16th birthday, heading north back to Milwaukee.

A year later, their parents were killed in a standoff with a pack of demonic black dogs that were haunting the Apostle Islands. The girls donated their books and possessions to the university, and 19-year-old Caroline became her sister’s guardian. They sold their modest home on Milwaukee’s south side, and took to the road. The brothers never saw them again, but news of their exploits made them happy.

\-----

Outside Topeka, Kansas - Spring 2001

Sam and Dean both felt ghostly kisses on their cheeks just before they set fire to their pyres. Hoped there was dancing in Heaven.  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Own nothing; rely on the kindness of strangers.
> 
> Kudos and comments appreciated - thank you.


End file.
